


The Magician & The Greywaren

by octoberfeeling



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: F/F, Genderswap, TRC WLW Week, WLW Week, fairytale AU, fem!pynch, trcwlwweek2k19
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 21:21:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20316193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octoberfeeling/pseuds/octoberfeeling
Summary: Once upon a time in Henrietta there lived a young Magician called Adalena Parrish, who was charged with the task of acquiring something called the Greywaren for the evil queen Corinna Greenmantle. To her surprise, the Greywaren was not a thing but an overwhelmingly beautiful girl called Rowan Lynch, who had a smile like the edge of a knife. Feelings, plotting, and chaos ensued.





	The Magician & The Greywaren

**Author's Note:**

> This is my contribution for day one of TRC WLW Week 2019! The prompt is fairytale/magic and what I intended to write as a oneshot has turned into a full-blown multichapter! So here are 3000 words before Rowan even speaks. Hope you enjoy, and stick around for upcoming chapters! I'm so excited!
> 
> For more info on WLW Week: trc-wlw-week.tumblr.com

Once upon a time, in the mystical mountains of Henrietta, lived the evil queen Corinna Greenmantle. There was nothing Queen Corinna coveted more than unimaginable wealth, power, and most of all, Magic. Queen Corinna had not been born with any special abilities, a blip in her royal bloodline. This meant that had she not been so wickedly clever and completely heartless, she never would have become queen. But the dirty work of eliminating anyone who stood between her and the throne had been nothing compared to what a challenge it was proving to be to convince the people of her newly-acquired kingdom that she was just as magically inclined as the long line of Greenmantles before her.

But our story is not really about Corinna Greenmantle. No, our story concerns Adalena Parrish, a young girl with little to her name but her Magic. Adalena had grown up in a village on the outermost edge of the kingdom for her entire life, with no one to talk to but her parents. Although, since her father seemed to be violently disappointed in everything she did, and her mother spent all of her time trying to appease or defend him, she really had no one. So she spent her young years hiding alone in the forest behind their home, practicing and refining her Magic. She could communicate with the animals in the wood without having to speak. She could predict her father’s rampages in sharp, painful detail, days before they would actually occur. At first, she thought this was just because he was predictable, but her premonitions were too eerily keen and accurate not to be influenced by Magic. She only wondered what they might be like if she had a larger, more interesting pool of people about whom to make predictions.

Adalena could usually quell her longing for connection with other, more compassionate human beings. She could usually get by with just the animals and her imagination. But deep in her soul, there was a constant yearning for  _ something more _ . So when her father came home from town one night, in a rampage she hadn’t bothered to look for in her recent scrying, ranting about the new queen’s proclamation demanding the attendance of all the kingdom’s Magically inclined youth at her palace in the coming days, Adalena felt a spark of opportunity catch flame in her heart. That night, when her parents were fast asleep, she gathered up what little food she could fit in her meager bag and set out on the two days’ walk to the palace.

When at last she reached the township that surrounded the palace, her feet ached and her head pounded from lack of sleep and insufficient food. But she could see the spires that topped the castle, and that was all that mattered. She knew her father would figure out exactly where she had gone, but she doubted he would mind having one less mouth to feed, so she tried not to worry about him coming after her. This was it. Her life was starting. She didn’t know why the queen required audience with young Magicians, but she didn’t care. She was out, free, ready to be her own person.

She made the few steps left between herself and the castle gate, took a deep breath, then walked through the gate and toward her future.

***

Seven months later, Adalena felt trapped all over again. This time, though, her captor was more powerful, more vindictive, and more dangerous than her father had ever been. Queen Corinna had summoned all the young Magicians to her side in order to make the kingdom believe that she had any Magical abilities herself. She had asked each of them to display what it was that they could do, and if it pleased her, she kept them. If she was not impressed, she commanded her guard to dispose of them. Adalena had been one of the lucky ones, and she supposed captivity was better than the alternative.

Adalena’s life now consisted of “advising” the queen during every waking hour. In the morning, Corinna would demand that she predict the events of the coming day. In the afternoon, Adalena was sent out into the nearby forest to spy on whisperings among the animals. In the evening, she returned and relayed any information she had gathered to the queen. Usually she had no real information to relay, as her forest visits were often spent daydreaming rather than spying. This position at the palace was… something. But it didn’t quite feel like the  _ something more _ she had always dreamt of.

She tried time and time again to use her Magic in order to see what lay ahead for her, but some sort of block (or perhaps it was an inability to imagine anything truly good happening for her) kept her from seeing anything beyond an endless loop of serving the selfish queen.

One morning, the endless loop was interrupted, finally, by something Queen Corinna could never resist: an opportunity for more power. Adalena sat outside the queen’s chambers, waiting for three other servants to finish the process of getting the queen dressed and silently sifting through the near future when something came through, clearer and more interesting than any of the usual village unrest.

_ A girl, about Adalena’s age, woke with a start. Her eyes opened, clear and piercing and filled with what looked like fear. The only thing that moved was the girl’s chest as she breathed heavily in and out, in and out. She appeared to be frozen there. In her hands she fiercely held onto two strange objects. One was black and hard to make out, but it looked soft. The other appeared to be some sort of box, etched on all sides with symbols and languages Adalena couldn’t understand. _

“Adalena!”

She snapped out of her reverie. Queen Corinna stood above her, too close, with her hands on her hips and an irritated look on her face. She must have been standing there longer than she wanted to.

“My apologies, your majesty.”

“Yes, yes, quit your daydreaming and get in here, you dirty freckled runt.”

Adalena followed the queen into her chamber, taking her usual place at the grandiose breakfast table in the center of the room once Corinna had sat down herself. Breakfast was laid out, far too much food for the queen to eat on her own, but Adalena had learned long ago that none of it was for her.

“I have a very special request to make of you today, Adalena,” the queen began, her voice strangely saccharine. “I have heard talk among the servants of the existence of an object that allows its owner to take things from their dreams.”  _ Take things from their dreams. Was that what the girl in Adalena’s vision had been doing? _ “I want you to do your…” she made an ambiguous gesture with her hands, “thing, and find this object for me.”

“I’ll do my best, your majesty.”

“You’ll find it, runt, or you’ll be useless to me.” Adalena knew what it meant to be useless to the queen. It meant death.

“Yes, your majesty.”

Queen Corinna offered her hands to Adalena, palms up, and Adalena took them in her own and tried to remain steady. She closed her eyes and began to see outside of herself again.

_ The same girl. Holding the same box. The soft black thing was nowhere to be seen, but Adalena thought she heard a birdlike sound coming from somewhere else in the house. This time, the girl was fully awake and moving. She was studying the box as though she didn’t fully understand it either. Adalena took a moment to observe the girl. She was striking. Her features were all sharp angles and those wild ice blue eyes looked down at the box with such intensity that Adalena thought she might bore a hole right into the wood. She had shorter hair than most girls Adalena had encountered, and it suited her. Adalena felt her heart flip over and had to remind herself where her physical body was and what she was doing. She focused in on the box in the girl’s hands and tried to comprehend anything about it. This had to be the object the queen meant, didn’t it? Such a strange-looking thing, so incomprehensible, there had to be something Magical about it. _

_ Suddenly, Adalena’s vision went entirely dark, a candle extinguished without warning. She heard a faint whispering sound, eery and unclear. It sounded as though the speaker was moving toward her. _

_ Finally, the whisper became sharp and clear, and Adalena heard one word: Greywaren. _

Adalena’s eyes snapped open and she gasped as she returned fully to her body. 

“Well?” Queen Corinna urged.

“Greywaren. That’s what the object is called. I think it’s some sort of box.”

“Is that all? What are we meant to do with only one word and the idea that it  _ might  _ be a box?”

Adalena didn’t dare divulge any details about the girl in her vision, for fear that the queen would persecute her directly. “It’s not nothing. It’s more than we had before, my queen. I believe, with my abilities and the help of some of the animals, I’ll be able to find it for you.”

“All on your own? Ha! Please,” she scoffed.

“Really and truly, your majesty. Give me a week. I will bring you the Greywaren.”

“One week. If you have not returned by then with the Greywaren, I will send my guard after you without hesitation.”

“Yes, your majesty. Thank you.”

Adalena gathered some food for the road and what little money she had, hoping that villagers would be kind enough to keep her during the nights for such scant payment. As soon as she stepped foot outside the castle walls, she realized she hadn’t a clue where to begin. She decided to go to the forest and scry. The trees and the creatures there always brought her peace and focus.

She lay on her back on the forest floor and inhaled deeply, breathing in the scent of evergreen and feeling her connection with the earth beneath her.

_ She saw the dreaming girl once more. The girl was not so focused on her dream things now. Now she tended a farm. A small patch of land on the outskirts of the kingdom, likely not far from where Adalena herself had grown up. The dreaming girl looked after cows, as a younger girl who appeared to be unrelated to her chased surprisingly patient fowl around in playful circles, golden plaits trailing behind her head. _

_ The girl paused in her task and turned her face toward the sun momentarily, lost in thought or perhaps waking dreams. Adalena drank in the sight of her ivory skin, her dark curls, the lashes that curtained those wild, pale eyes. She thought she could somehow feel a connection to this girl she had never met. _

Adalena knew she would need to return to her body soon, but she wanted just one more brief moment to watch the dreaming girl enjoy the sunlight.

_ “Come on, Maddie. Time to come inside,” the girl called to her smaller, bird-chasing companion. Maddie joined the dreaming girl and they walked inside the house, leaving Adalena outside alone far sooner than she would have liked. _

Adalena returned to her physical form much slower than usual this time, and she knew she would have to be careful during the days it would take to reach the dreaming girl. She couldn’t wander too far from herself, or stay away for too long, she knew. She could drain herself of energy, or worse, she could go far enough that she would never be able to return.

Heading toward her childhood home was her best option at this point, so she set off in that direction and hummed to herself in order to keep her mind off of the slew of emotions that came along with the idea of being anywhere near her father again.

As she walked, she wondered for the first time how she would actually accomplish the task at hand. She had practically signed up to steal the Greywaren, whatever it was, from this dreamer girl. Would she have to sneak around in order to get her hands on it? If she encountered the girl in person, what would she say? Would she be able to talk the girl into willingly handing it over?

And, if Adalena couldn’t convince her, would she have to capture the dreaming girl and return her and the Greywaren to the palace by force? She didn’t think she was prepared to do that.

Her anxious wondering, mixed with plenty of daydreams concerning the dream girl’s eyes, made the trek seem easier and the time pass much quicker than she expected. By dusk of the first day, she was already over halfway there. She stopped to rest in the first township she came to, thankfully only having to knock on three doors before someone answered who was willing to accept her few coins in exchange for a place to sleep, and some food in the morning.

The next day, she awoke before the sun, too anxious to sleep any longer. She took an apple from the bowl on the table, left a note of gratitude next to the bowl, and took her leave. She estimated that she would only be walking two or three more hours before she would reach the village where the dream girl likely resided.

The hours were filled with more unanswerable questions and more daydreams filled with a mess of dark hair and milky ivory skin. Hardly any time had seemed to pass when she found herself in the familiar wood near her parents’ home. A wave of painful and complicated emotions swelled in her the second she recognized her surroundings, and she had to sit down for a moment at the base of a sturdy beech tree, one that knew her. Her energy was so connected to this place that she hardly even made the conscious choice to scry before she was doing it.

_ What Adalena could see were her own feet, moving surely and swiftly forward, carrying her toward something that felt a lot like destiny. She continued staring downward and observed the earth underneath her as she walked. She passed over the forest floor, along a dirt pathway, and through tall grass that whipped the backs of her hands as she walked. _

_ Her feet stopped. She raised her head. There was the farm. _

When she returned to herself, she knew exactly where she had to go. She half-ran over the forest floor, propelled by excitement at the idea of really meeting the dreamer girl. She had to know her. Her doubts slowed her down as she went along the dusty pathway. She feared the girl’s reaction, didn’t know how to protect her from the queen. But she had to know her. So when she reached the edge of the grass field, she started to run. The grass whipped the backs of her hands, just as it had in her vision, and she could see the farmhouse ahead of her. Her heart raced, and not just from the exertion.

She stopped abruptly a few meters from the house. She tried to catch her breath, but even when it slowed, she still felt like she couldn’t fill her lungs enough. The anxiety would probably kill her if she didn’t do something about it, so she forced her legs to move once more, and was knocking on the door before she even had a chance to second guess herself.

The younger girl, Maddie, answered the door.

“Hello!” Maddie said cheerily. Adalena tried to be subtle as she peered past Maddie into the house, looking for the dream girl. “Are you looking for Rowan?” She must not have been subtle enough. “You look awfully pale.” Did she? “Why don’t you come in and sit down.”

Maddie took Adalena’s hand, far too trusting, and led her to the table in the small kitchen of the farmhouse. She sat down across from her and had just opened her mouth to ask more questions when another voice came from behind Adalena.

“What’s this, Madelin?” Adalena turned to see a strangely distorted version of the girl from her visions. She had the same dark curls, but she was shorter and stockier than Adalena had seen, and her eyes were too dark to be right.

“I don’t know who she is, Della, she hasn’t said a word yet, but she looked pale - doesn’t she look pale? So I thought she ought to sit down.”

“Well run and fetch her some water, and then we’ll figure out what this is all about.”

Della took Madelin’s place across from Adalena at the table and sat with her back so straight it must have been uncomfortable. She was a little intimidating, and Adalena had an inkling that this was her goal. She stared daggers into Adalena for what felt like an eternity, before Madelin came to her rescue with a cup of water. She nodded gratefully and tried to smile at Madelin, but she worried it may have come off as a grimace since she was steeped in deep anxiety at this point. She was uncertain whether she would be able to open her mouth at all for fear of spilling out everything she had been sent here to do.

As soon as she swallowed a sip of the water, Della was on her like a hawk. “What is your name, stranger?”

“Adalena. Parrish. I’m Adalena Parrish.”

“Well, Adalena Parrish, from where have you come?”

“The palace.” Della bristled at this, but she felt it wasn’t worth it to try lying. Della would likely catch her at it.

“What business could someone from the  _ palace  _ have all the way out here?”

Adalena scrambled for what to say and had almost settled on a version of the truth when a third voice entered the room, this time one that Adalena recognized.

“Della, we’ve talked about interrogating visitors at the kitchen table.” Della scowled deeper. Adalena was frozen. She didn’t know how she would respond when she turned her head to look at Rowan, so her body had decided she wouldn’t look.

Rowan had other ideas, apparently. She strode over to stand behind Della and clapped a hand down hard on her shoulder, flashing a wicked smile. She must have been working on something out in the fields, because her skin had a sheen of sweat and half of her curls had been roughly knotted on top of her head. The skirts of her simple dress were tied up to one side to keep them out of the way, and underneath Rowan wore sturdy boots of brown leather. Adalena resolved to finally look into the piercing eyes she had seen in her head, and she could never have prepared for the rush of new emotions that overcame her the moment she met Rowan’s gaze. She even thought she saw Rowan’s sharp-edged façade falter for the smallest second, but she righted herself quickly enough and said, “Hello, gorgeous. Has the queen finally sent one of her minions to fetch the Greywaren?”

Adalena startled and remembered why she had come.

“You have it?” Adalena inquired, wide-eyed at the immediate acknowledgement of her true purpose. 

“Rowan,” Della warned.

“You could say that,” Rowan laughed.

“What, isn’t it here?”

“Oh, it’s here,” Rowan stated plainly, “but it’s not really something one can  _ have. _ ”

“What could you possibly mean by that?” Adalena pleaded, growing desperate in her desire to understand. She had to know what the Greywaren was and how she was going to get it back to the queen, or she had to contemplate what her last words were to be.

Then Rowan swiftly and effectively threw off any previous plans Adalena had come up with in just four words: “I am the Greywaren.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!! More chapters are on the way, but I've never written a multichapter before so it might be a while. But I'm very excited to keep this going!
> 
> find me on tumblr: octoberczerny.tumblr.com  
more info on wlw week: trc-wlw-week.tumblr.com


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